Interesting fact: Can human organs be replaced?

Throughout the ages, organ replacement has always been a common concern. With the advancement of science and technology, this beautiful idea has become a reality. Organ transplantation is actually the practical application of organ replacement. In 1954, Joseph Murray completed the world's first successful organ transplant operation, ushering in a new era and winning the Nobel Prize in 1990.

Today, organ replacement has become a very familiar topic. I believe many people have heard of various examples of organ transplantation, such as the most common kidney transplantation. There are even many people who make fun of selling kidneys. For example, I watched a web drama called "Micro-Ability" before, in which the kidney transaction was directly turned into a stock market.

So, which organs of our human body can be removed without affecting the normal function of the human body? Or, to go further, which organs of our human body can be replaced? Is the much-hyped head transplant surgery credible? Today we will do a virtual "surgery" and replace the human organs step by step.

01. Classification of organ resection levels

First, for ease of understanding, we define five levels of resection, with the danger level increasing exponentially.

Class E: basically no impact, such as appendix and teeth

D: Minor effects, such as limbs

Class C: Partially affected, requiring additional replacement, such as kidney removal requiring dialysis

Class B: The impact is very serious and the patient is basically unable to leave the hospital. For example, cardiac resection requires continuous extracorporeal circulation.

Level A: Involves the essence of life and is currently difficult to accomplish: such as removing the cerebellum and restoring nerves.

Everyone, please sit down and let’s start the removal.

02. E-level resection: basically no impact

First: the appendix. The appendix is ​​located in the lower right part of our abdomen, between the cecum and the ileum, and is a relatively closed area. A large number of results show that appendectomy has basically no effect on the human body. Of course, some studies have also found that the appendix actually has certain benefits for the human body, such as it may be related to immunity, so normal people do not need to specifically remove the appendix, but for patients, the benefits of removal are greater.

Second: Teeth. Teeth are our body's chewing organs and the hardest organs in our body. They can help us tear or grind food and promote physical digestion.

Teeth can be replaced. As we all know, many people have unhealthy tooth development, such as impacted teeth. Some people's wisdom teeth can cause waste accumulation and cause toothache.

Third: Other accessory organs. Some of our human bodies have some accessory organs such as nails and hair that can also be removed. For example, when we do various hairstyles.

The above content does not affect our existence, but the following ones will bring inconvenience to our lives.

03, D-level resection: partial impact

Fourth, limbs* The significance of limbs. I believe everyone understands that we can’t walk, run, shake hands or hug without our limbs. When we type out lines of words on the keyboard or flexibly pick up delicious food with chopsticks, we seldom realize how important our limbs are to us.

However, sometimes, we have to face some limb injuries caused by various reasons, such as car accidents, diseases, etc. Fortunately, limbs are replaceable to a certain extent. For example, in the Paralympics, many people with limb loss can still achieve great results.

Fifth, reproductive organs. Reproduction is necessary for human reproduction and inheritance, but reproduction itself is not necessary for humans, otherwise there would not be many DINK families. Reproductive organs can be removed, the typical example is eunuchs.

Many transgender people also use artificial vagina implants.

Sixth: Bladder. The bladder is the urine storage organ of the human body. It is a sac-shaped structure composed of smooth muscles, located in the pelvis, and its rear end opening is connected to the urethra. There is a sphincter at the junction of the bladder and the urethra, which can control the discharge of urine.

For some patients, the bladder has a more serious disease and can only be removed. At this time, people can use other external devices to store urine.

Seventh: Gallbladder. This pear-shaped sac located behind the liver under the right ribs has the function of concentrating and storing bile. Bile is mainly used for fat digestion and absorption, but bile itself is not produced in the gallbladder, but comes from the human liver . Therefore, the gallbladder can also be removed.

Of course, courage has nothing to do with guts.

The following contents are more serious . Resection is acceptable, but replacement organs must be used to supplement it, otherwise it will seriously affect people's health.

04, C-level resection: partial impact, requiring additional replacement

Eighth: Intestinal system. The intestine is the largest digestive organ in the human body and also the largest detoxification organ in the human body. It includes the duodenum, jejunum, ileum, cecum, colon and rectum, with a total length of about 7 meters. Our food digestion mainly occurs in the intestine.

The intestines belong to the human digestive system, digesting food and providing nutrition.

Can it be removed? --Yes! As long as you don't take the direct feeding method , the whole system can be removed.

Alternative method: directly provide nutrition by infusing nutrient solution, such as patients who cannot eat.

Ninth: Stomach. The stomach is the enlarged part of the digestive tract, located below the diaphragm, connected to the esophagus above and the small intestine below. Nowadays, many people have irregular diets, which leads to insufficient gastric motility and even stomach pain.

So, can the stomach be removed? Yes! In fact, as long as you don't need to eat, the entire eating system can be removed. We have seen that some people cannot eat in clinical practice, so they will maintain their lives by inputting nutrients, which shows that the stomach can be removed to a certain extent . But from then on, you will no longer have the chance to eat delicious food, and I believe that many people will not be happy about this happiness.

Tenth: Kidney. Kidney is responsible for filtering impurities in the blood, maintaining the balance of body fluids and electrolytes, and finally producing urine to be excreted from the body through subsequent pipes; it also has endocrine function to regulate blood pressure.

Our human body has two kidneys. Sometimes, if one kidney is damaged, the other kidney can still function to make up for the deficiency.

So kidneys can also be removed. What's more, some people can still survive even if both kidneys are removed. They use extracorporeal filtration to replace kidneys. Although kidneys are very easy to transplant, the practice of removing both kidneys overnight like in "Micropower" is a bit dramatic.

Kidney transplantation requires matching, rejection, physical examination and many other factors, and it cannot be completed in a short time.

Eleventh, spleen. The spleen is an important lymphatic organ, a flat oval organ. It has the functions of hematopoiesis, blood filtration, removal of aging blood cells and participation in immune response.

Can it be removed? --Yes! Some people can survive after having their spleen removed due to spleen trauma, local spleen infection or cancer. However, they need to take medicine to maintain its function.

05. B-level resection: The impact is great and it is basically impossible to leave the hospital

12. Liver. The liver is an organ in the body that mainly performs metabolic functions, and plays a role in deoxidation, storage of glycogen, synthesis of secretory proteins, etc.

Can it be removed? - Partial removal is feasible. Currently, most liver resections are treated by partial resection. The liver has a strong healing ability and can recover to a certain extent. For example, some people with liver damage can undergo surgical resection to maintain liver function.

However, I have not heard of the whole liver removal, although in theory, we believe that we can maintain these liver functions through in vitro injection. It must be pointed out that this replacement is very dangerous and requires a thorough understanding of the human body's various metabolisms and timely replenishment of various substances needed by the human body, especially protein. Alcohol causes serious damage to the liver. Many alcoholics suffer from alcoholic liver disease, and obesity can also cause liver lesions. For everyone's health, we should reduce alcohol intake.

So far, only the heart and lungs are left. So, can these two be removed?

Thirteenth: Lungs. Lungs are the respiratory organs of the human body, located in our chest cavity, one on each side. They are one of the essential conditions for our survival.

So, can the lung be removed? Theoretically, we can just provide the appropriate amount of air to allow it to enter the blood circulation. Is it feasible? Let's look at a technology. Clinically, there is a technology called extracorporeal membrane oxygenation.

The principle of this technology is to use a semipermeable membrane to build a complete extracorporeal circulation, allowing oxygen to combine with red blood cells while removing metabolic waste such as carbon dioxide, thereby achieving respiration. This method plays an important role in the auxiliary respiration of lung transplantation and the auxiliary treatment of acute respiratory failure.

Therefore, from this perspective, the lungs can also be replaced to a certain extent.

14. Heart. The heart is the most important organ in the human and vertebrate body. Its main function is to provide pressure and circulate blood to all parts of the body.

Can it be removed? ——Yes! For this, you can refer to the extracorporeal circulation surgery during heart surgery. By establishing an extracorporeal circulatory system, arterial and venous circulation can be achieved. Therefore, in this case, the heart can also be replaced. The following figure is a schematic diagram of heart replacement

This is actually an artificial heart, but it is relatively large and simple. For example, this British man Matthew Green is equipped with a complete artificial heart and has been living for several years.

Well, up to now, we have basically removed all the organs of a person. The parts below the neck can be removed through extracorporeal circulation or injection.

06. Class A: Involving the essence of life, currently difficult to complete

In the past two years, there has been a hot news about head transplants. So, can head transplants be realized? I have reservations about this.

Although we know that the brain can maintain life as long as it is provided with enough nutrients and air, such as in vegetative patients, it is still difficult to determine whether our technology has reached such a level that we can directly provide the necessary substances to the brain. After all, the commander of the human body is the most core organization.

Well, I believe that after reading the above answers, you will definitely have the same idea as me. With the current technology, the above can all be realized. So, does it mean that in the future, it is feasible to use machines to replace the human body? (In fact, pacemakers and the like are one kind)

I believe that with the advancement of materials science and the development of advanced technologies such as 3D printing, we can develop many new organs in the future. For example, lungs or kidneys made of semi-permeable membranes, mechanical hearts made of high-strength materials, etc., all of which can provide important sources for our future organ replacement. For example, the knee joints made of artificial alloys can completely replace human joints.

Of course, the development of modern biotechnology can also provide us with many new organs. For example, organs cultivated by stem cell technology are not only more tenacious than mechanical organs, but also come from the human body. Therefore, they can match our needs to the greatest extent and avoid immune rejection. These are what we can look forward to in the future. However, we must point out that, to a large extent, our human body is very delicate, and native organs are often superior to foreign organs.

Organ transplantation has some impact on the body, including kidney removal or transplantation. In addition to immune rejection, there will also be problems with the function of the organ. However, many times, we have to perform organ transplants because the damage to these organs affects people's survival. So, it is a trade-off.